Hi Moms,
I have an 8 month old baby boy that is really inconsistent in his sleep patterns. We have a strict schedule that we go by nightly... eat dinner, bath, book, night time bottle, and bed. He ALWAYS falls asleep while eating an then we put him to sleep by 8pm. We will try to keep him awake to get him to "fall asleep on his own" but he always nods off. The problem is that he wakes nightly from around 3-7 off and on and always demands a bottle or he keeps getting more and more fussy and isn't able to put himself back to sleep without it. I know that we have made the mistake of letting him fall asleep while eating but now it seems that we just can't kick the habit. Has anyone else experienced this?? All advice is welcome :)
I could possibly be that he needs to go to bed a little earlier. Sometimes when babies wake early it's because they aren't getting enough sleep. If he's falling asleep with the bottle, it could be because he's too tired or just because it's such a soothing thing to drink from the bottle, but I think I might try doing the same routine but getting him down by 7:30 and see if that works.
I was right there with you 8 years ago! My son was 8 months old and used to falling asleep while eating. He would not settle himself either. I moved his bedtime up to 7 pm and read the book by Dr. Ferber. Yep - the crying one. I had already tried ALL of the other methods and was at my wit's end. In 1 week of "Ferberizing" he was sleeping naps (2 one-hour naps) and nighttime (7 pm to 7 am) on his own and was a new child (and I was a new mommy!) It is not for everyone, but it worked for me. Good luck!
Your baby IS "sleeping through the night."
For a baby.... 'sleeping through the night' means, sleeping for at least 5-6 hours straight.
Your baby is doing that.
He goes to bed at 8:00, then does not wake until 3-7:00am.
That is normal.
He is hungry.
And at ab out 9 months old, maybe now even, they go through a GROWTH-spurt... and need more intake and the frequency increases too. Intake has to keep pace with and keep up with a baby.
For our Pediatrician, she says for the 1st year of life, to feed On-demand, and that a baby's PRIMARY source of nutrition for the 1st year is from breastmilk or Formula. NOT solids and not other liquids.
This is a building-block time, of development.
Appetites, changes every day. And a baby's need for intake.
Although you have a 'strict' 'schedule'... that does not mean a baby's biological needs, goes by a schedule. It does not.
Also: teething and normal developmental/cognitive/physical development and hitting milestones, also tweaks a baby's/child's sleep.
Normal stuff.
You are lucky. My kids as babies, both of them, woke up every 3 hours or so... during the night. And I breastfed. So I woke too. And fed them.
all the best,
Susan
Ok, maybe try to give him some of the bottle before his bath then finish the rest before he goes down. That way he will get the whole thing and maybe wont be hungry early in the morning. The other thing to look at is he getting enough calories during the day to hold him over all night? If thats not the case and it is habit, you could try a water bottle. Usually if its just a habit this works. But, look at how much formula hes taking in during the day and make sure he is getting at least 24 ounces a day along with food. Good luck and hope this helps!
I'm right there with you and will be reading the responses (but my boy is almost 10 months). I finally got him off his night feeding, but he still gets up several times. Any "sleep training" method that involves letting him cry for any amount of time ends up getting him too worked up to sleep. Actually, after I tried a few days of some controlled crying methods, he now wakes completely at night rather than just needs help settling back to sleep. It backfired! Sigh...my daughter was such an easy sleeper...this is a whole new world for me! Yawn! My guy starts his intermittent waking usually by 2, so it is a long night. Feel free to PM me at 3am if you want to commiserate! LOL
The waking is a habit, so you need to break it.
One method to try: set your alarm and go in about 5 minutes before he normalyl wakes. Make a little noise, enough to get him to roll over, and then wait. His sleep cycle should reset. Do this for 3 nights, and then do nothing. He should sleep the extra hour. Let him do that for a few nights, and then try to get him to go another hour.
If he is really hungry, then I say feed him but we had a similar situation with our oldest when she was about 6 or 7 months old. She woke at 3am EVERY night and it was killing me. What we finally did was switch that 3 am bottle with water. She didn't like it nearly as much and eventually quit waking up for it. Good luck!!!
I would try to move bedtime UP a little bit. At that age, our daughter was already in bed between 7:00 and 7:30. Sometimes moving bedtime UP helps them actually sleep LONGER. And if you are having to keep him awake to put him in bed still awake, then you are just waiting too long to put him into bed.
Also, I would switch up your bedtime routine. Do not continue to give the bottle last. I would do dinner, bath, bottle, brush teeth (yes you need to swipe their gums with a damp rag or something even if they have no teeth... it will make teeth brushing SOO much easier later on, and it is good for their gums to have the bacteria wiped away too.. but I digress), dinner, bath, bottle, brush teeth, book, bed.
Like another poster mentioned, he may not be getting his full bottle if you do it last and he is falling asleep with it. Also, since it is the last thing he does before sleeping, it IS his sleep cue, and so when he wakes during the night, hungry or not, he needs it to go back to sleep. If you switch the order so that the bottle is earlier in the bedtime routine, he will learn to fall asleep with some other soothing mechanism. Whether it is rubbing the edge of his blanket, sucking a paci or his fingers, hugging a soft cuddly animal or whatever... it will be something that he can do during the night without you. Does he have a "lovey"?
Even adults wake up many times during the night. The difference is that we don't fully wake, we reposition ourselves or whatever, and drift right back into sleep. Babies (at his age) usually can do the same thing, if they have a way to self-soothe. Right now, his soothing is coming from the bottle.
As far as "kicking the habit"... why can't you kick it? Just switch the routine. Of course it will take a little longer and he might fuss a little the first few times... but that is to be expected when you are in effect, taking away his bedtime cue/self soothing mechanism. Make sure he has a "lovey" of some sort to sleep with and replace giving him a bottle last thing, with giving him the "lovey" last thing, while he is still slightly awake, but drowsy, after the story or singing a song or two. And move bedtime UP by 30 minutes.
That's what I did with ours. After the story and prayers, the light was turned out (no nightlight either) and we rocked in the dark for a few minutes while I sang a soothing lullaby or two. Not TOO long... or they'd fall asleep. Before they actually fell asleep, I would get up and put them into the crib while whispering that it was time to go to sleep. Then kisses.. night night.. sweet dreams. And I left.
You know what you need to do, it sounds like you just need to be reassured that it is the right thing. It is. You can do it!
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we used to do a "dream feed" where we'd pick the baby up, about 11ish, feed her her bottle, then put her back to bed without waking her up. This seemed to top her off for the night.
Does he use a pacifier? That would satisfy his need to suck and he can certainly put it in his own mouth, at 8 months, during the night. Maybe you could move his bedtime to a bit earlier and use the paci for him to fall asleep after he has the bottle. This would replace the need to suck on the bottle.
